The growth in popularity of the Internet and other computer networks has fueled not only an increasing availability, but an increasing appetite among consumers for digital information. Consumers typically seek access to this information using an access device, such a computer, to communicate with an online information retrieval system. The information retrieval system typically includes a graphical user interface for entering and submitting requests for information, known as queries, to a remote search engine. The search engine identifies relevant information, typically in the form of documents, and returns a results list to the access device, enabling the user to access one or more of the listed documents.
One problem that the present inventor recognized in conventional information retrieval systems concerns the identification of information within search results. Conventional systems are generally focused on presenting the user with any and all results that match their queries, leaving users to figure out which documents among thousands or millions of documents best meet their needs. Users typically browse the results, select some for use, and discard the vast majority. This process is typically manual and the users generally have little or no sense of how good their selections are or even how good their initial set of search results were. Indeed, users typically take it on faith that the search technology provided quality results in relation to their search term(s).
Accordingly, the inventor has identified a need for tools that assist users in assessing and improving the quality of the documents they select from search results.